"Vincent-sama… there's something I'd like to do, if you have the time?"

And it's with those quiet, pretty words, that one simple, short little request, that Vincent finds himself sucked into Ada's world once more. He isn't too pleased by it, really, and it is with a frown that he seats himself at a low table and watches her toy and shuffle some deck of cards.

No, really and actually, he is watching her.

She is pretty like this, he notes. She's always pretty, of course, but with her corset a bit loosened in their casual setting well after dinner and a show, her hair a bit mussed from the brisk wind of winter, she's lovely. Ada's cheeks are a little flushed from that same wind, her lips a might bit parched, but Vincent simply looks– simply watches the way her tongue flicks over that full, plush lower lip and he longs to reach out and run his thumb over it, longs for her to flick that tongue against his fingers and watch her skin turn flush for an entirely different reason.

Ada's brow is furrowed in a different kind of concentration, however. She is peering at those cards like they are some kind of a lifeline, wide green gaze wider still and worried.

Worried over him.

"What is it, Miss Ada?"

Her teeth are worrying her lower lip now, and Vincent sighs to himself as he realizes he sort of likes that, too. Troublesome. Her beauty is both a gift and a curse when it comes to this game.

"The reading." And she gestures to the cards as if they actually mean something. Vincent tries not to look bored. It's difficult, because she starts going on and on about how bad it all looks. Something about the High Priestess and internal conflict and emotional instability and longing and Vincent barely represses a scoff.

Nonsense, all of it.

What good is it to tell something how they will live or die, anyway? At least, that is what he thinks when he considers far grander things – the scale of victory that she will bring him by revealing where the Vessalius key is, the scale of satisfactionit will bring him to bed her, to use that bit of conquest to better his brother's life, once and for all…

" – and when the Lovers are reversed, it means a fear of commitment."

Vincent definitely choked.

She is just sitting there, nervously, hesitantly looking back at him, and he merely stares, stunned, a little annoyed, a little flabbergasted that she would even suggest–

Is she mocking him, or –

No.

Perhaps what bothers him most of all is the clench in his chest, the startlingagony at the thought that perhaps he is, indeed, missing out on something.

"With all due respect, Miss Ada, I don't put much stock into these things."

And she smiles, nods, a bit embarrassed – shuffling her cards back into a neat stack and suggests that maybe, perhaps, they should spend the evening in another way.

Vincent tries not to think on how his mind immediately drifts to what those otherways might be. Perhaps the suppleness of her thighs wrapped about his hips, the softness of her throat between his teeth as he tugs, the warm fullness of her bosom beneath his hands –

Ada Vessalius is a bit too much, even for a man like him.

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